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CORRECT HEPHAESTION TOMB
By Prof.ByLefteris Kaliambos (Kaliambos-Natural Philosophy) December 2014 ( I DISCOVERED THE GOLDEN SECTION IN CARYATIDS OF THE HEPHAESTION CONIC PYRAMID IN AMPHIPOLIS AND THE ASTRONOMICAL NUMBERS 7, 12 AND 3) This photo is from the interview I gave to the author of Spititual Thassaly , Dimitra Bardani, through the TV Thessalia (Greece) about the Correct Hephaestion Tomb. According to the History of Greek People ( Ekdotike Athenon , Volume Δ page 208) after the death of Hephaestion (324 BC) and using the secrets of the Oracle of Amun for the DIVINE HERO HEPHAESTION Alexander the Great ordered his architect Dinocrates for planning a monument for the DIVINE HERO HEPHAESTION having a base at a size of one stadion. Based on this historical source and on the astronomical numbers of ancient astronomy, I discovered that the conic pyramid at Amphipolis has a diameter d = 1 stadion = 157.5 m.and the golden section of Caryatids. However in the absence of a detailed knowledge about the ancient Greek astronomy the architect of the excavation team in Amphipolis did not relate the diameter of the Amphipolis conic pyramid with the one Alexandrian stadion ( 1 St = 157.5 m) used by Dinocrates for both Alexandria in Egypt and the conic pyramid in Amphipolis. In my Book COSMOGONY, (which in 1911 has won an award by the International United Poets Laureate) , I describe carefully how Eratosthenes ( 250 BC ) found the circumference of the Earth by using the Alexandrian stadion = 157.5 m, and how Aristarchus of Samos based on the discovered diameter of the Earth developed his heliocentric system which did much for the progress of astronomy and of the fundamental physics at the time of Newton. ( See also “Eratosthenes- WIKIPEDIA” and my paper “DINOCRATES”). Unfortunately the archaeologists in Amphipolis have put forward one complicated argument in favor of Dinocrates having built the Amphipolis tomb based on a map of ancient Alexandria. It was drawn by Mahmoud Bey in 1866 following his extensive excavations across the site of the ancient city performed in 1865. He inferred the size of a stade, to have been 165 m in Alexandria by noting incorrectly that the separations of the roads in the street grid were fixed numbers of stades. Whereas the diagram in the History of Alexandria-WIKIPEDIA has the HEPTASTADION which is just 7 stades in length, since one stadion = 157.5 m. He also reconstructed the course of the ancient city walls on the basis of excavations on the eastern and southern sides, but in the west and to some extent on the northern side he had to guess their course in many places, due to modern developments having made the necessary excavation sites inaccessible. He came up with an incorrect overall perimeter for the walls of 96 Alexandrian stades or 96X165 =15.84 Km. Unfortunately the Amphipolis archaeologists noticed that the Alexandrian wall circuit of Mahmoud Bey, is almost exactly one hundred times the diameter of the Kasta Mound as defined by its circular surrounding wall, which they have measured outside the surrounding wall at 158.4m. Note that they measured outside the wall a perimeter C = 497 m with a diameter d = 158.4 m, while the correct C/π = 497/3.1416 = 158.2 m. To avoid this inconsistency I published my paper CONFUSING KASTA TOMB AND GEOMETRY because I discovered that the Amphipolis conic pyramid is the only one survived monument which gives us the unit of length used by Dinocrates for both Alexandria and the Hephaestion tomb in Amphipolis. In fact, Dinocrates using the radius R = 1 St / 2 = 157.5 / 2 = 78.75 m determined the perimeter C = 2πR = 6.2832X78.75 = 494.8 m and the volume V of marbles as well as the dimensions of the height T of the pyramid and the total H of the lion with its two bases by using the astronomical numbers 3, 7 and 12. ( See my DISCOVERIES IN AMPHIPOLIS). It is indeed unfortunate that in the absence of a detailed knowledge about the ancient astronomy including the stadion of 157.5 m and the sacred astronomical numbers 7, 12 and 3, the author Andrew Chugg complicated more the problem. In a criticism of the incorrect hypothesis of the excavation team the author in his “Lingering Mysteries of the Amphipolis Tomb ” complicated more the problem by writing: “Usually in Greek cities the stade was defined as measuring 600 feet. So for, example, in Athens a stade was 185 m. However, Alexander the Great employed men called bematists to measure the distances between the towns and cities that he passed through on his campaigns.” Then he continues: “But it would of course have been impractical for the bematists to measure distances of hundreds of km between cities by putting their feet down heel to toe repeatedly, so they must have used paces instead of feet to define their stade. In fact we know that a Roman mile was defined as 1000 paces and that is 1481m, so it is likely that Alexander’s bematists were using a stade of 100 paces.” In other words Andrew Chugg believes incorrectly that one stadion = 100 paces or 100X1.48 = 148 m. Moreover he continues incorrectly as: “Anyway, it is clear that the diameter of the Kasta Mound at Amphipolis is actually remarkably close to the stade used by Alexander’s bematists. And actually the Alexandrian stade of 165m is closer to the bematists’ stade than to the 600-foot stade of other cities. The conclusion could be that the architect of Alexandria and the architect of the Amphipolis tomb both paced out their plans in a fashion similar to Alexander’s bematists. So there is a slight link after all between Deinocrates, the known architect of Alexandria, and the architect of the Amphipolis tomb. Furthermore, Deinocrates is associated with projects that were intended to impress through extraordinary size, so that is another good reason to consider Deinocrates to be a candidate in the case of the Kasta Mound. We can certainly say that an illustrious Greek architect designed the Kasta Mound and its Lion Tomb with a 100 pace diameter in order deliberately to impress through size and through a planned size of exactly one of Alexander’s bematists’ stades.” Under this wrong condition confusing enigmas continue to envelop the story of the divine hero Hephaestion in Amphipolis conic pyramid . Then after the discovery of the skeleton a number of questions should be answered about the skeleton's gender. There is a chance that this question will be answered conclusively in the coming months through the promised laboratory investigation of the skeleton, while according to the Greek archaeologist Faclaris the skeleton should not be in the main grave . Katerina Peristeri, head of the excavation, noticed at the Ministry of Culture presentations (November 29, 2014 ) that nobody currently has any idea of the skeleton’s gender, because the bones were too fragmented for the archaeologists to be able to check the features that determine gender. Nevertheless, she repeated her previous opinion that the occupant is most likely a male and one great hero of Alexander’s generals, because of the lion which was on the top of the conic pyramid. Note that in Amphipolis there is a block with part of a shield from the lion monument that once crowned the conic pyramid at the Kasta hill. This has been the standard idea of scholars ever since the fragments of the lion monument were rediscovered more than a century ago. Parts of the shields can clearly be seen on some of the blocks now stored near the reconstructed lion monument near Amphipolis. Of course my discovery that the diameter of the conic pyramid is equal to the one Alexandrian stadion (d = 1 stadion = 157.5 m) supports strongly the idea that the conic pyramid was planned by Dinocrates for the Divine Hero Hephaestion. On the other hand for the occupant of the grave inside the conic pyramid the Professor of Classical Archaeology Panagiotis Faklaris, who has served for 36 years the excavation at Vergina in northern Greece in an interview with The TOC pointed out that the size of the grave, as well as the material used for its creations are not consistent with the greatness of this burial monument. “If we take into consideration what has been announced about Amphipolis, we cannot draw the conclusion that the main body buried in Amphipolis is the one found.” Faklaris further states that the body found may have been buried there either before or after the time of the construction of the Kasta Hill burial monument. So in case in which the excavation team in Amphipolis will discover more small graves in the large conic pyramid of Hephaestion, they will be graves of later times in the very magnificent tomb made for the divine hero HEPHAESTION. (See my TOMB OF HEPHAESTION IN AMPHIPOLIS). However the author Andrew Chugg believes that a monument with a male lion and shields should not necessarily commemorate a man. (See in Google “Lingering Mystery of the Amphipolis Tomb”). He emphasizes that in the period of the Amphipolis conic pyramid it happened that two royal women took a leading role in warfare. Firstly, Eurydike, who was a granddaughter of Alexander’s father, Philip and second, Olympias, the mother of Alexander the Great. So Andrew Chugg speculates that the monument with shields would be entirely appropriate for either of these queens. But such hypothesis cannot be supported by the historical sources. According to the History of Greek People ( Volume Δ) Euridike became the queen in 321 BC by marrying Philip- Arrhidaeus, the mentally retarded half- brother of Alexander, whom the troops had elected to the monarchy in Babylon on Alexander’s death. In 317 BC Eurydike tried to win precedence for her husband over the official joint-king, Alexander IV, Alexander the Great’s 6-year-old son. This prompted Alexander IV’s grandmother, Olympias, to lead her nephew Aeacides’ army across the mountains from Epirus into Macedonia to defend her grandson’s rights. Olympias in 317 BC killed Euridice and Phillip-Archedaeous, and Cassander buried them at Aegea- Vergina. For example In the “ Euridice-WIKIPEDIA” one reads: “ Her body was afterwards removed by Cassander, and interred, together with that of her husband, with royal pomp at Aegae.” Whereas in 316 BC Cassander in Pydna of Macedonia Killed Olympias without burying her. In the “Olympias-WIKIPEDIA” one reads : “When the fortress of Pydna fell Cassander ordered Olympias killed but the soldiers refused to kill the mother of Alexander. In the end, the families of her many victims stoned her to death with the approval of Cassander, who is also said to have denied to her body the rights of burial.” On the other hand according to the Greek ”Ολυμπιάδα- Βικιπαίδεια” the tomb of Olympias is probably near Pydna. Note that Roxana and her son (Alexander IV ) were protected by Alexander's mother, Olympias, in Macedonia, but her assassination in 316 BC allowed Cassander to seek kingship. Since Alexander IV was the legitimate heir to the Alexandrian empire, Cassander ordered him and Roxana to be killed in Amphipolis ca. 310 BC. So Roxana and Alexander IV were leading candidates a few years ago, but the excavators no longer consider them likely. On the other hand one of the royal tombs discovered by the archaeologist Manolis Andronikos in the so-called "Great Tumulus" in Vergina in 1977/8 is believed to belong to Alexander IV. Moreover some archaeologists believe that Nearchus (who was one of the officers, a navarch, in the army of Alexander the Great) was a candidate when it was simply thought to be a Lion Tomb without the colossal mound, but the huge size of the tomb now makes that extremely unlikely. Also, despite claims on the internet, Neartchus was born on Crete not at Amphipolis; we also have no idea when let alone where he died, as he is last attested to our knowledge in 312 BC at Gaza fighting Ptolemy. The brothers Laomedon and Erigyius were also not important enough for such a huge tomb, and they are describes in sources as from Mytilene, where their father certainly originated. Laomedon features little during the campaigns of Alexander, but after his death according to Appian. The first satrap of Syria was Laomedon of Mitylene, who derived his authority from Perdiccas and from Antipater, who succeeded the latter as regent. To this Laomedon, Ptolemy, the satrap of Egypt, came with a fleet and offered him a large sum of money if he would hand over Syria to him, because it was well situated for defending Egypt and for attacking Cyprus. When Laomedon refused Ptolemy seized him. Laomedon bribed his guards and escaped to Alcetas in Caria. Thus Ptolemy ruled Syria for a while, left a garrison there, and returned to Egypt. We don't know what became of his after the coup of Antipater. Erigyius probably died in Sogdiana, now northern Afghanistan, in 328/327 BC. Cassander married Thessaloniki, Alexander's half-sister, and is possible but so are many others. Cleopatra the full-sister of Alexander was given a beautiful funeral by Antigonus - who had probably been behind her murder, but since that took place at Sardes, it is likely her tomb was there too. Leonnatus, a relative of Alexander's who had planned to marry Cleopatra in order to reinforce his claim to the throne of Macedon is possible but unlikely - although the Lion would have made a nice pun on his name. Several of the leading candidates can be excluded, but who the body was is not yet certain. According to Peristeri the conic pyramid at AmphIpolis was started after the death of Alexander in 323 BC. It is well known that Perdiccas in 323 BC canceled the construction of the so-called expensive PYRE for Hephaestion. However after the death of Perdiccas (321 BC), Antipater in Macedonia should order Dinocrates for replacing the expensive Pyre by the conic pyramid based on the topography of the Kasta hill. It may have been left empty and served as a cult centre, for the DIVINE HERO HEPHAESTION once it became clear that Alexander's body was not coming back from Egypt.Category:Fundamental physics concepts